REALMS archive of entities

Maitreya

deity sky Buddhist single tradition · 4

Maitreya is a future Buddha figure venerated in both Mahāyāna and non-Mahāyāna Buddhism. He is sometimes represented seated on a throne and is associated with expectations of a heavenly helper, positive righteousness, the future millennium, and universal salvation. Some scholars have speculated that inspiration for Maitreya may have come from the ancient Iranian deity Mithra and Zoroastrian concepts of the Saoshyant or coming saviour-prophets.

↻ synthesized from 4 sources

When

First attested
0 CE
Attested period
0 – 2020

Relationships

co occurs with
Apollo-Helios-Mithras-Hermes-Stilbon, Saoshyant, Samantabhadra, Sarvanīvaraṇaviṣkambin, Śākyamuni Buddha, Lokastotrapūjā-nātha, Manjushri, Taras, Vairocana, Vajrayogini, Nairatmya, Padmasambhava, Amitabha, Bhaiṣajyaguru, Sakyamuni, Akshobhya, Amoghasiddhi, Ratnasambhava, Ākāśadhātvīśvarī, Locanā, Māmakī, Paṇḍāravāsinī, Kurukullā, Nageshvara Raja, Vajradhara, Mahavairocana, Nagarjuna, Vajrapāṇi, Kṣitigarbha, Ākāśagarbha, Hachiman, Guan Yu, Vajrasattva, Vasudhara, Cundī, Sūryaprabha, Candraprabha, Sarvanivāraṇaviṣkambhin, Prajñāpāramitā-devi, Bhaiṣajyasamudgata, Bhaiṣajyarāja, Akṣayamati, Ushnishavijaya, Cintamanicakra, Mahāsthāmaprāpta, Avalokiteshvara, Mitra
syncretized with
Mithra, Budai

Expand to full subgraph →

Mentioned by

Sources

wikipedia (4)
  1. Mitra
  2. Kṣitigarbha
  3. Budai
  4. Buddhist deities

Source passages

“Maitreya is sometimes represented seated on a throne, and venerated both in Mahāyāna and non-Mahāyāna Buddhism. Some have speculated that inspiration for Maitreya may have come from the ancient Iranian deity Mithra.”

#3889 · extracted by anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.5

“Kṣitigarbha (Sanskrit: क्षितिगर्भ, Tibetan:སའི་སྙིང་པོ / ས་ཡི་སྙིང་པོ, “Essence of the Earth”) is counted among the Eight Great Bodhisattvas (byang chub sems dpa’ chen po brgyad), together with Mañjuśrī, Avalokiteśvara, Vajrapāṇi, Samantabhadra, Ākāśagarbha, Maitreya and Sarvanīvaraṇaviṣkambin.”

#14462 · extracted by google/gemini-2.0-flash-001

“A note dated 28 March 917 claims that he was an incarnation of Maitreya, the Buddha of the Future.”

#21105 · extracted by google/gemini-2.0-flash-001

“Maitreya (Pali: Metteya) currently resides in Tushita Heaven, and this figure is one of the few bodhisattvas who have a prominent place in Theravada. Maitreya ("Friendly One"), will become the Buddha of our world in the future”

#22050 · extracted by anthropic/claude-sonnet-4.5